College Football Today

STARS

— Texas’ Colt McCoy threw for 277 yards and a touchdown and the fifth-ranked Longhorns knocked off No. 1 Oklahoma 45-35 in Dallas.

— Oklahoma’s Sam Bradford threw for 385 yards and five touchdowns. But he also had an interception in the Sooners’ loss to Texas.

— Texas Tech receiver Michael Crabtree caught five passes for 89 yards and two touchdowns as the seventh-ranked Red Raiders defeated Nebraska 37-31 in overtime. Crabtree has 32 career touchdown receptions, a school record.

— Southern California tailback Joe McKnight carried 11 times for a career-high 143 yards to help the eighth-ranked Trojans drub Arizona State 28-0.

— Army fullback Collin Mooney ran for 229 yards, his second straight career-high outing, and the Cadets beat Eastern Michigan 17-13 for their second straight victory.

START THE CAROUSEL

No. 2 Alabama had the right idea Saturday.

The Crimson Tide took the day off and survived an upsetting day at the top of the polls.

Oklahoma woke up as the No. 1 team in the country and went to bed in fourth place in the Big 12 South, thanks to a 45-35 loss to No. 5 Texas.

It was that kind of day.

The top-ranked Sooners tumbled, No. 3 Missouri lost to 17th-ranked Oklahoma State 28-23 and No. 4 LSU was blown out by 11th-ranked Florida 51-21.

LSU’s loss was notable because the defending national champs were the last unbeaten from the preseason Associated Press Top 10, outlasting Mizzou by about a half-hour. (Texas opened the season at No. 11.)

So what does it all mean?

It means that the Crimson Tide are in line to become the new No. 1 when the new Associated Press Top 25 is released on Sunday.

It also means that none of the highly ranked teams that went down on Saturday are out of the national title hunt, although Oklahoma now needs help to beat out Texas in the Big 12 South.

“It’s not over by far,” said OU receiver Manny Johnson, who caught three touchdowns.

NO REST FOR THE ‘HORNS

Congratulations, Mack Brown, on your exhilarating 45-35 victory over top-ranked Oklahoma in the Red River Shootout.

“Right now, this team would be known for heart and character and toughness and playing together,” Brown said. “There are not individuals on the team, not guys who talk about themselves. It’s been about `this team’ from Day 1.”

The Longhorns figure to creep up from No. 5 in Sunday’s Associated Press Top 25. But it won’t be easy for them to stay high in the rankings.

No. 3 Missouri, smarting over its loss to Oklahoma State, visits Austin next Saturday, and the red-hot Cowboys, ranked 17th, come to town the next weekend.

The Longhorns visit No. 7 Texas Tech on Nov. 1, and two weeks later they go to No. 16 Kansas.

AM I BLUE?

Lloyd Carr had Appalachian State.

Now Rich Rodriguez, Carr’s replacement at Michigan, has Toledo.

Rodriguez presided over an unfathomable 13-10 home loss to the Rockets, Michigan’s first loss in 25 games against Mid-American Conference opponents.

The MAC has some solid teams, but Toledo isn’t one of them. The Rockets came to Ann Arbor 1-4, and their resume included blowout losses to Ball State (31-0) and Arizona (41-16).

The Rockets ranked 110th in scoring defense, conceding 35.8 points per game. But they limited Michigan to one touchdown under Rodriguez, an offensive mastermind.

“I wasn’t in a hurry to get off the field,” Toledo coach Tom Amstutz said. “I lingered a little bit because it was such a great feeling.”

The Wolverines (2-4) have their worst six-game record since 1967—two years before Bo Schembechler started coaching them—and their streak of playing in 33 straight bowls is in jeopardy.

THEY’RE GOLDEN

Minnesota had the nation’s worst defense a year ago, conceding 518.7 yards per game en route to a 1-11 record.

Things have turned around under new defensive coordinator Ted Roof.

The Golden Gophers’ defense gave up 551 yards against Illinois on Saturday, but they turned in numerous big plays to pull out a 27-20 victory in Champaign.

The Gophers staged a dramatic goal-line stand, stopping elusive Fighting Illini quarterback Juice Williams on fourth-and-goal. They also returned Williams’ fumble for a touchdown and sacked him five times.

DOOM IN THE DESERT

Arizona State won its first eight games under new coach Dennis Erickson last year, rising to No. 4 in the Bowl Championship Series standings. Since then, the Sun Devils are 4-7 after a 28-0 pasting at No. 8 USC on Saturday.

The Sun Devils dropped to 3-27 against the Top 25 since 2000. They’re 1-5 under Erickson in that span, with the five losses coming by an average of 19 points.

Adding to Arizona State’s woes, starting quarterback Rudy Carpenter left the game in the second half after apparently aggravating an ankle injury. Carpenter made his 37th straight start, the second-longest active streak in the nation.

The Sun Devils aren’t alone in their misery. In-state rival Arizona dropped out of first place in the Pac-10 with a 24-23 loss at Stanford.

LEACH GOES HOLLYWOOD

Tied 24-24 with Nebraska, Texas Tech faced a fourth-and-5 at its own 36 midway through the fourth quarter. Red Raiders coach Mike Leach decided to go for it, and quarterback Graham Harrell hit Michael Crabtree for a 47-yard gain.

Five plays later, Harrell scored to put the Red Raiders up 31-24, and they went on to a 37-31 overtime victory.

“It’s like Sharon Stone said one time after a movie she did. She said, ‘No guts, no glory,”’ Leach told a television interviewer afterward. “Well, I thought we might be able to draw them off, and then if we didn’t, I felt like we could get it, and we did.”

15 MINUTES OF INFAMY

In what has to be one of the worst quarters by a USC quarterback in school history, Mark Sanchez threw three interceptions and lost a fumble in the third quarter of a 28-0 victory against Arizona State.

BY THE NUMBERS

Stanford (4-3, 3-1 Pac-10) matched last year’s victory total with a 24-23 victory over Arizona. With third-string quarterback Alex Loukas leading a last-minute drive, the Cardinal rallied to win on Toby Gerhart’s 1-yard with 25 seconds to play in Palo Alto. … Miami forced Central Florida to punt a school-record 12 times in a 20-14 Hurricanes victory. … No. 9 BYU fell behind New Mexico 3-0 in the second quarter before rallying for a 21-3 victory. It’s only the second time this season the Cougars have trailed. … Missouri kicker Jeff Wolfert broke the school career scoring record with an 18-yard field goal against Oklahoma State. The kick gave Wolfert 287 career points. … Michigan has 19 turnovers and 15 touchdowns.

THEY SAID IT

“This is only one game and it’s over now. We can learn from our mistakes and refocus our efforts on the rest of our games from here on out. We still have a lot of football left to play.”—Oklahoma quarterback Sam Bradford.

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